“Ya Wanna Do It Here Or Down The Station, Punk?” Jennifer Ridyard

Yep, it’s rubber-hose time, folks: a rapid-fire Q&A for those shifty-looking usual suspects ...

What crime novel would you most like to have written?
Lauren Beukes’s THE SHINING GIRLS. Yes, it’s a serial killer novel that veers crazily into time travelling science fiction, but it’s done wonderfully, with a clear head and an unswerving belief in itself, and it’s just brilliant. I’m consumed with admiration, possibly even a girl-crush.

What fictional character would you most like to have been?
Lyra, from Philip Pullman’s ‘His Dark Materials’ trilogy. Armoured bears, animal souls, a multiverse, a cracking adventure and a mighty pop at the status quo? What’s not to love?

Who do you read for guilty pleasures?
Twitter.

Most satisfying writing moment?
Finishing, obviously. And then stroking the published cover like a proud mammy. But there’s also a delicious pleasure in re-reading what you’ve done after one of those rare afternoon’s when you’ve smoothed out a knot and everything has just flowed. Chances are you realise it’s pretentious bollocks the next day, and delete it all, but still. It’s nice.

If you could recommend one Irish crime novel, what would it be?
Arlene Hunt’s THE CHOSEN. Great writer, cracking story, without any pretensions about being anything but. Though it’s not set in Ireland. Does it still count?

What Irish crime novel would make a great movie?
See above!

Worst / best thing about being a writer?
Worst: having to show someone what you’ve written - letting them loose on your babies to scoff and mock and call them ugly. It’s pure self-doubt. Best: when you’re told your babies are smart and beautiful!

The pitch for your next book is …?
Eh … Well, I guess it’s part two of ‘The Chronicles of the Invaders’. Nuff said.

Who are you reading right now?
John Wyndham’s THE CHYRSALIDS, again, and just for laughs THE STATE OF AFRICA by Martin Meredith.

God appears and says you can only write OR read. Which would it be?
Read! Do I have to have a proper job too or can I just read? Bliss.

The three best words to describe your own writing are …?
Anecdotal, bold, emotive.

CONQUEST by Jennifer Ridyard and John Connolly is the first novel in ‘The Chronicles of the Invaders’ series.

Last Night I Dreamt I Went To Pemberley Again

I had one of the most enjoyable experiences of my writing life yesterday evening, when interviewing PD James (right) in the Public Theatre at Trinity College. And when I say ‘interviewing’, I mean ‘struggling to get a word in edgeways’. The Right Honourable Baroness James of Holland Park, OBE – or Phyllis, as she insisted we call her – was in sparkling form, and really could not have made my job any easier. She was truly wonderful company, and the tone was set from the very beginning when the packed audience – 600 or thereabouts – gave her a standing ovation when she first appeared.
  The evening took place under the auspices of the UNESCO / Dublin City of Literature, in association with Trinity College, to celebrate the 200th anniversary of the publication of Jane Austen’s PRIDE AND PREJUDICE. PD James has, of course, written a sequel-of-sorts to that book, DEATH COMES TO PEMBERLEY, and most of the conversation was taken up with a chat about Jane Austen and PEMBERLEY. So what was her publisher’s reaction when she suggested rewriting Jane Austen as a murder mystery? “Oh, one never tells one’s publisher anything,” was the gist of the reply.
  Anyway, the very good news to come out of last night’s chat was that PD James has just begun – at the tender age of 93 – another Adam Dalgliesh novel. Here’s hoping the Baroness returns to Dublin to celebrate that particular delight.

And So To Kildare …

It’s off to Kildare for yours truly on Saturday, October 12th, to take part in the Kildare Readers’ Festival in the company of Declan Hughes (right) and Brian McGilloway. I’m really looking forward to it – Declan and Brian are two very smart guys when it comes to talking about books, and never fail to entertain.
  Declan Hughes is the author of five novels in the Ed Loy series, Dublin-set private eye stories reminiscent of the style of the classic gumshoe tales of Dashiell Hammett, Raymond Chandler and Ross Macdonald. His most recent offering is CITY OF LOST GIRLS.

  Brian McGilloway (right) first came to our attention with his Inspector Ben Devlin series of police procedurals, which are set on the border between Donegal and Northern Ireland. He has also published LITTLE GIRL LOST, featuring DS Lucy Black. HURT, the sequel to that book, will be published in November.
  The event takes place at the Riverbank Arts Centre at 3.30pm on Saturday, October 12th. Admission is free. For all the details on how to book your tickets, etc., clickety-click here …

Killer Queens

The Red Line Book Festival in Tallaght will feature an intriguing evening’s conversation between some of Ireland’s best female crime writers on October 18th, as Susan Condon hosts a discussion between Alex Barclay, Arlene Hunt and Louise Phillips. Also taking part is Joanne Richardson, a former county coroner from Colorado, a state where Alex Barclay has set her last couple of novels. Should be a terrific evening. The details:

Main Auditorium @ Civic Theatre, Tallaght
Friday 18th October, 8pm
Tickets €12/€10 concession
Booking at 01 4627477; boxoffice@civictheatre.ie

A killer evening not to be missed! Popular crime writers Alex Barclay, Arlene Hunt and Louise Phillips share insights into creating a gripping thriller with special guest Joanne Richardson, former County Coroner of Summit, Colorado. Writer Susan Condon chairs this lively panel discussion.

  For all the details, clickety-click here …

On The Road

Brian McCabe, a friend of a friend – or a friend of a neighbour, to be precise – has just self-published a novel, THE STONEY ROAD, which should appeal to fans of Kevin McCarthy’s work. Quoth the blurb elves:

As Ireland begins her difficult, troubled journey towards independence, the Berford and McNeill families find themselves struggling with upheavals of their own. These two families are brought together by marriage and then torn apart by death, war and loss. THE STONEY ROAD chronicles a city in turmoil as a country tries to find itself. Crowds line up to welcome the king to Dublin, but rumblings of rebellion can already be felt in the dark alleys and smokey pubs. Soon people will have to decide whether to be loyal to their past or embrace an uncertain, dangerous future.
  Between 1900 and 1922, the very idea of Irishness was redefined. A new nation emerged from the rubble of war. And two families had to find their own roads out of the ruins.

  What caught my eye on this one is the Introduction, which is written by one of the great pioneers of the Irish crime writing boom, Eugene McEldowney. “The author has set himself an ambitious project but he acquits himself with distinction,” writes Eugene. “He brings to the task an intimate knowledge of the geography and history of his native city and makes it come vividly alive for the reader.”
  For more, clickety-click here …

Review: TAMPA by Alissa Nutting

Celeste Price, the narrator of Alissa Nutting’s debut novel Tampa (Faber & Faber, €14.99), is a high school English teacher in Florida. Married to a local police officer, Celeste is friendly, helpful and dedicated in her vocation. Respectability personified, she harbours a dark secret: Celeste has made it her life’s work to put herself in a position where she can prey sexually on 14-year-old boys. It’s a chilling tale in many respects, not least because Celeste suffers no crisis of conscience about her deviant behaviour and the effect it might have on the young men she targets, but it’s very difficult for the reader to dislike Celeste herself. Her first-person voice is charming, self-deprecating and witty, the amiable tone drawing the reluctantly complicit reader deeper and deeper into her immorality. There are echoes of Humbert Humbert and Tom Ripley to be heard here, and also Jim Thompson’s charming psychopath Lou Ford (Celeste’s husband is called Ford), but Nutting’s reinvention of the taboo-breaking femme fatale results in a self-determining female protagonist reminiscent of those created in recent years by Gillian Flynn and Megan Abbott. That said, Celeste Price is a unique creation and Tampa is a singular tale. It may well be the most challenging crime novel you’ll read all year. – Declan Burke

  This review was first published in the monthly crime fiction column in the Irish Times. Also reviewed were the latest offerings from Jo Nesbo, Nele Neuhaus and Joe Joyce.

Perchance To Dream

I had a nice little back-and-forth with Adrienne over on Goodreads a couple of weeks ago about the ‘It was all a dream!’ story. Adrienne isn’t a fan, and I know she isn’t alone. Personally, I have no problem with a story that eventually reveals itself as a ‘dream’ – a good story is a good story.
  I suppose there’s an element of feeling cheated when a story is revealed to be a dream, or not real. It’s the Bobby-in-Dallas scenario, where a series of Dallas starts with Bobby stepping out of the shower, and we realise that the entire previous series was all Bobby’s dream. Viewers who invested in the characters and their ups and downs felt cheated, because it meant that none of those ups and downs really happened.
  Of course, we all know that none of those events really ‘really happened’ – for all that it was rooted in a recognisable reality, Dallas was fiction. But maybe that’s the crux of the matter, the unspoken agreement when it comes to fiction. The writer does his or her best to make a story realistic, and the viewer or reader meets the writer halfway in suspending his or her disbelief.
  If the writer oversteps the mark and makes it explicit that the fiction isn’t real, the illusion is shattered. An intact stained-glass window is a fabulous creation; the smashed fragments of a stained-glass window rather less so.
  I have a dog in this fight, so to speak. Absolute Zero Cool is a story about an author interacting with his characters as they try to write a novel. Absolute Zero Cool is a fiction, but it’s one in which ‘reality’ interacts with ‘fiction’ as the author struggles to control his characters. Some people liked the premise; others found it off-putting and alienating.
  Perhaps that’s because all fiction, regardless of genre, is escapism. Even the most seriously intentioned of literary fiction transports us to a different world, or at the very least a different way of experiencing this world. That’s a wonderfully liberating sensation, a kind of out-of-body experience that allows us to see and hear and know things we might never otherwise have known if we had remained mired in our own reality.
  If a fiction fails in terms of escapism – if it reminds us too forcefully that it is fiction – then the effect of the stained-glass window, that prism that allows for the beautiful interplay of light and imagination, collapses at our feet. John Gardner – a novelist in his own right, but perhaps better known as the author of On Becoming a Novelist, and for being the mentor of Raymond Carver – declares that a good story should be “a vivid, continuous dream”. The dream must be vivid, but it must also be unbroken.
  On the other hand, we’re all adults. We know that we can’t travel interstellar distances. We know that ghosts don’t exist. We know that private eyes don’t solve murder mysteries with a gun in one hand and a dry martini in the other. We know, as we physically turn the pages without allowing our imaginations to blink, that we are complicit in making this dream ‘real’.
  It takes a lot of psychic energy on the reader’s behalf to make the dream ‘real’. Perhaps that’s why the ‘It was all a dream!’ story feels like a cheat to some people. Or why some readers object to being reminded that the ‘dream’ is in actual fact a dream.
  But is that kind of story any less legitimate than the story that is fully escapist? Is a story, say, in which characters become aware that they are characters at the mercy of an interventionist Creator, a waste of a reader’s psychic energy? And is it superfluous arrogance on the part of the writer if, having met with a reader who fully commits to the dream, he or she then whispers in their ear, ‘Remember, it’s naught but a dream.’
  I’d love to hear your opinions, folks …